Hands-On With The Samsung Gear S Smartwatch

Samsung announced its new curved-display smartwatch last week, but today we were able to get up-close and personal with the new wearable. Unlike most smartwatches, the Gear S has two very special features. The first is a curved 2-inch, AMOLED display, and the second is 3G connectivity, allowing the smart watch to be used independent of a smartphone.

The curved display measures in at a 260×480 resolution, and under the hood you’ll find a GPS sensor, an accelerometer, gyroscope, UV detector, barometer, and heart rate monitor, alongside 4GB of internal storage and 512MB of RAM. It’s all powered by a dual-core 1.0 GHz processor and Tizen, Samsung’s own mobile operating system.

Users can receive messages, emails, get directions, and even make calls all with the smartwatch itself, which is being debuted alongside the Samsung Circle Bluetooth headset.

Initial reactions are that it’s huge and clunky, though that won’t be as much of a problem for you big strapping men as it is for me. The curved display is interesting and eye-catching, and gets the job done.

Since the Gear S has its own 3G modem, users now need a QWERTY keyboard to shoot off messages when necessary. However, the QWERTY keyboard and predictive text may take a while to get used to. In my ten minutes with the watch, I was unable to quickly and effortlessly type a message correctly. Luckily, the Gear S comes equipped with S Voice, Samsung’s voice transcription software.

All in all, the Gear S is an interesting option in the smart watch landscape, but we’re still unclear on pricing. Expect to see the Gear S in stores in October.

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